Trump Quietly Shutters the Only Federal Agency that Investigates Industrial Chemical Explosions
plants, regulators and business groups. The CSB doesn’t impose fines or penalties, instead relying on voluntary compliance or on enforcement by other agencies, such as the EPA, to mandate safety improvements.
Of the more than 100 investigations the CSB has conducted, Texas leads the country with 22 cases, followed by Louisiana with eight.
“Those numbers tell us that Louisiana and Texas really need the Chemical Safety Board, and there will certainly be negative impacts here if it closes down,” said Wilma Subra, an environmental scientist with the Louisiana Environmental Action Network.
Along with the Dow chemical explosion, the agency has four other active investigations of incidents in Texas, Kentucky, Georgia, and Virginia. CSB investigations often take several months to complete.
In an update of the Dow explosion investigation last year, the CSB hinted at “several events of concern” at the chemical complex between Baton Rouge and the town of Plaquemine — an area that forms part of the industrial corridor known as “Cancer Alley.” Among the targets of the investigation were at least two mechanical problems, multiple smaller explosions after the initial blow-up, and the release of more than 30,000 pounds of ethylene oxide, a colorless gas the agency noted is a cancer-causing substance.
The CSB’s last completed investigation was a fatal 2024 explosion at a steel hardening facility in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The CSB identified several safety failures and at least three other dangerous incidents involving similar hazards at other facilities owned by the same company, HEF Groupe of France.
HEF “failed to ensure that information about those incidents and lessons learned from them were shared and implemented organization-wide,” the CSB investigation, released early this month, found.
A chain reaction of mishaps at the Chattanooga facility resulted in an eruption of “hot molten salt” that killed a worker, according to the investigation.
On average, hazardous chemical accidents happen once every other day in the U.S., according to Coming Clean, an environmental health nonprofit. Coming Clean documented 825 fires, leaks and other chemical-related incidents between January 2021 and October 2023. The incidents killed at least 43 people and triggered evacuation orders and advisories in nearly 200 communities.
Trump called for the CSB’s closure during his first term but settled for leaving many investigator and agency leadership positions unfilled. Slowing the agency’s work resulted in a backlog of 14 unfinished investigations by the time former president Joe Biden took office in 2021.
Under the first Trump administration, investigations were hampered by staffing shortages and monthslong conflicts between the board and the agency’s Trump-appointed director, according to a federal inspector’s report.
In the new budget proposal, the Trump administration indicated the CSB’s duties could be handled by other agencies.
“The CSB duplicates substantial capabilities in the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to investigate chemical-related mishaps,” a CSB budget proposal said. “This function should reside within agencies that have authorities to issue regulations …”
This justification is “a lie,” said Jordan Barab, a former deputy assistant secretary of OSHA and a former CSB recommendations manager.
While OSHA and the EPA are limited to assessing specific violations of their existing standards and regulations, the CSB can look far more broadly and at the “deeper causes” of accidents, including worker fatigue, corporate budget cuts, and lax oversight, Barab said.
Even when other federal agencies appeared to ignore CSB recommendations, community groups and local governments could cite them when pushing for improved safety standards, Ozane said.
“It was scientific evidence we could all use to pressure the state or the federal regulators to do something about pollution and safety in the places we live,” she said. “This is just another tool and another resource that’s been taken away from us.”
Tristan Baurick is Regional Reporter for Grist, based in Louisiana.This story was originally published by Grist. You can subscribe to its weekly newsletter here.This coverage is made possible through a partnership between Grist and Verite News, a nonprofit news organization with a mission to produce in-depth journalism in underserved communities in the New Orleans area.
